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This week we’re looking at our relationship to … stuff!
Sandra Goldmark is my guest. Sandra is a designer, teacher, repair entrepreneur and climate activist. She’s the director of Campus Sustainability and Climate Action at Barnard College, where she is assistant professor of Professional Practice in Theatre. She is also the founder of Fixup, which is a series of pop up repair shops in New York City. In this episode, Sandra and I discuss her new book, Fixation, and how to have a simpler, healthier, more sustainable relationship with our stuff.
Her philosophy of stuff works in five steps: “Have good stuff (not too much), mostly reclaimed. Care for it. Pass it on.” Mostly reclaimed stuff (step 3) is essential and better for the environment. Producing and distributing new stuff typically involves an extraction of resources and manufacturing generates waste. These environmental costs are not factored into the market price of new stuff nor paid for by the companies who design and manufacture our stuff. In addition, there are social costs to producing at low and unfair wages. By buying reclaimed, we minimize the environmental and social consequences of producing new stuff.
To further minimize these consequences, Sandra guides us to buy less stuff (step 2) and extend the life of our products. We extend the life of our products by caring for our stuff (step 4), including through repair instead of disposal. However, some stuff is hard to repair (and made that way by design) and finding a repair service can be challenging too. And given the way goods are produced and priced, it’s often cheaper to buy new. This works in favor of businesses as it translates into profit.
In our current linear economy, we extract resources to create products that are generally disposed of after somewhat limited use. Economic growth in a linear economy is driven through increased consumption. Sandra advocates for and proposes changes that would move us towards a circular economy. A circular economy is one where economic growth is uncoupled from increased consumption. It is a model that seeks to prevent waste and maximize the value of already extracted resources. One way to move towards a circular economy is for businesses to build out repair systems. In this way, they develop an additional revenue stream through repair services (instead of only through sales of new stuff) thereby sparing resource depletion and creation of waste.
Sandra explores these topics deeply in her book, Fixation, and offers guidance to both individuals and businesses. At the heart of it, she invites us all to embrace a model that acknowledges the deep value of maintenance, preservation and care in our lives and in the economy. It is a lack of care for our stuff and our planet that is breaking the planet. We can choose to care. And our individual choices, like our votes, matter.
I highly recommend reading Sandra’s well-researched book, which provides a lot of background and insight on the subject of stuff. She approaches the subject through many lenses, including an anthropological one. From her perspective, stuff is a blessing. She does not deny us the pleasure of stuff; instead, she invites us to do better with it. Her message is an important one. It’s time we listened!
In this Episode
The importance of looking at our relationship to stuff [01:13]
The stuff movement, Marie Kondo, minimalism and recognizing that our system of stuff is not healthy [03:45]
Sandra’s stuff philosophy in five steps [06:40]
Buying mostly reclaimed stuff and expanding our thinking around buying reclaimed stuff [08:16]
The impact of our individual buying choices on the environment [16:08]
A takeaway from running pop up repair shops [18:04]
The circular economy as a system to address waste [20:08]
How our stuff is artificially underpriced [24:02]
Valuing care and “maintenance work” [26:00]
How we create meaning with our stuff and use it to tell the story of our lives [30:03]
A good first step in changing your relationship to stuff [34:26]
Links from the Episode
Fixation is available for purchase through your local bookseller or at Barnes & Noble.
Sandra’s website
Instagram + Twitter: @sandragoldmark
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